


Call the Search Off

by kuumai



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Light Angst, Minor Aang/Katara, Minor Sokka/Suki, POV Zuko (Avatar), Platonic Soulmates, Zuko (Avatar)-centric, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:47:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28370373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kuumai/pseuds/kuumai
Summary: “A dragon,” Lu Ten says in a hushed, awed tone. “Your soulmate must be someone very important.”Most of the time, Zuko doesn’t bother thinking about his soulmate, but that night, sitting with Lu Ten, he feels almost enthralled.Someone very important.
Relationships: Aang & Zuko (Avatar), Lu Ten & Zuko, Sokka & Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 231





	Call the Search Off

Zuko’s soulmate is older than him. 

He knows this because his mother tells him that he was born with his soulmark. The soulmark appears on both parties when the younger of the two is born, so his soulmate must have been born before him.

Other than this, Zuko knows nothing about his soulmate for certain. 

Unfortunately, his father does not care about soulmates, so Zuko is not allowed to research about them or speculate about who his might be.

Fortunately, his father does not care about soulmates, so as long as Zuko does not value his unidentified soulmate over his family, having a soulmark is not on the extensive list of reasons for which his father might punish him. 

His mother has a soulmark. She won’t show it to him, so he wonders if she is his soulmate until he has bothered her enough about her mark that she tells him that her soulmate is gone. She looks so sad in that moment that Zuko is shocked into silence. He doesn’t ask about her mark anymore. 

Azula does not have a soulmark, and she seems to think this is something to flaunt to him. 

He and Azula sit by the turtle-duck pond, and he tosses them food as Azula tells him about how free she feels, not having her destiny tied to someone she doesn’t yet know. 

A lot of what Azula says to him upsets or embarrasses him, but this is one thing that does not bother him overmuch. He is not ashamed of his soulmark because it isn’t important to him. His destiny is not his soulmate; his destiny is to bring glory to the Fire Nation. A soulmate will always be secondary. 

So he sits quietly and lets Azula speak her piece. She is not special for lacking a mark, just as Zuko is not special for having one. Around six in every ten people have one.

Zuko is lucky, at least, that his mark is not in a noticeable place. It’s a little dragon wrapping around his left ankle, and his shoe hides it easily. 

Some nights, when he cares enough to inspect his mark, he’ll sit on his bed and trace the red scales from the dragon’s back to its tail. 

One such night, he’s laying on his back on top of the covers with his left leg stuck straight up in the air. He’s thinking about how his soulmate is probably a firebender, considering his mark is literally one of the original firebenders. 

In fact, he’s so lost in thought that he doesn’t notice his cousin enter his room at first. 

“Good, you’re awake,” says Lu Ten. “Did you happen to pick up the book I was reading when we were in the library earlier? I can’t seem to find it anywhere.” 

In surprise, Zuko tucks his knees toward his body, then fumbles unsuccessfully with the sheets to hide his legs. 

Still standing near the door, Lu Ten blinks in confusion a few times before processing the situation. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

Zuko finally manages to cover his ankles. “It’s okay,” he says, but he can feel that his cheeks are flushed. 

Lu Ten is quiet for a few seconds, then steps farther into the room. “Here, I’ll show you mine.”

Zuko hunches his shoulders and wrinkles the sheets in his fists, but watches with curiosity as Lu Ten sits on the edge of the bed. He didn’t know Lu Ten had a mark.

Lu Ten holds his long, black hair up in one hand and bares the back of his neck. Through the dim lighting, Zuko has to squint to see the image of three gray rectangles, stacked like bricks, on Lu Ten’s neck. 

“Boring, right?” Lu Ten says, letting his hair fall again after a moment. “I haven’t met my soulmate yet. I wonder if it might be romantic.”

Zuko tilts his head. “What do you mean, romantic?”

Lu Ten turns to face Zuko. “Your soulmate might be a close family member, or your best friend, or your true love.” The corner of Lu Ten’s mouth turns up, and something in his eyes makes him look younger for a moment. “My soulmate could be the future Fire Lady. You know, far in the future.”

Intrigued, Zuko nods. Then he hesitantly moves out from under the covers and shows Lu Ten his ankle. 

“A dragon,” Lu Ten says in a hushed, awed tone. “Your soulmate must be someone very important.”

Most of the time, Zuko doesn’t bother thinking about his soulmate, but that night, sitting with Lu Ten, he feels almost enthralled. _Someone very important_. 

Lu Ten becomes a soldier soon after their exchange, and after that he is rarely at the palace, and Zuko is left with no one with whom to speculate about soulmates in the quiet of night. 

Other than his mother, sister, and cousin, he doesn’t know whether anyone else has a soulmate. To be fair, he isn’t close to many people, and the subject of a soulmark is not something one mentions around acquaintances. 

That is, he doesn’t know of anyone else until the situation with Ty Lee.

He’s walking past the courtyard when he hears a greater-than-usual commotion and looks over to see Azula and her friends. Mai is perched indifferently on the edge of the fountain, watching Azula and Ty Lee argue. 

“I already told you; I don’t have a mark,” Ty Lee says. 

“Obviously you do!” Azula exclaims. “Why else would you wear those even during the summer?” She motions toward the cloth wrapped around each of Ty Lee’s wrists. 

“It’s fashionable,” Ty Lee insists. 

“Then take them off and show me,” Azula says, placing her hands on her hips. 

“I don’t want to,” Ty Lee says, and Zuko and Azula both know that means she does have a mark. She doesn’t often contradict Azula. 

Azula darts forward suddenly to grab Ty Lee’s arms, and Ty Lee pulls against her, but Azula is strong. 

“Let go!” Ty Lee yells, near tears. 

Zuko is next to them grabbing Azula’s wrists almost before he realizes he’s moving. “Let go,” he repeats. 

Azula looks very briefly surprised to see him. She does let go, pulling easily out of Zuko’s grip, but she does it scoffing. “Of course,” she sneers. “The baby comes to rescue the baby. She’s my friend, Zuzu. I don’t see why it matters.”

“If she doesn’t want to show you, she doesn’t have to,” Zuko says, folding his arms and glaring at her. 

“Why shouldn’t she? I thought you were the one who believed soulmarks are not something to be ashamed of. And yet you walk around with yours covered all the time.”

Azula knows that it is commonplace to keep marks covered. In fact, were he to walk around with his ankles showing, he would definitely receive a lecture from one or more of his tutors. She’s just saying this to rile him up. He knows this, and he is riled up nonetheless. 

Mai and Ty Lee both politely look at the grass, as if averting their eyes will convince him that they cannot hear the conversation. 

Zuko huffs and storms away, pretending his face isn’t warm with embarrassment. 

It’s only a few months later that they receive word that Lu Ten has died. When he hears of this, his first thought is that Lu Ten’s soulmate must not have been the future Fire Lady. He imagines Lu Ten falling in love with a fellow soldier, or even meeting someone in one of the small towns outside of Ba Sing Se. 

His second thought is that, since Uncle Iroh has no other children, Zuko is suddenly very likely to become Fire Lord one day. Lu Ten had seemed hesitantly excited at the idea of finding a romantic soulmate in the Fire Lady, but Zuko doesn’t share this excitement. A growing cynicism deep in his chest whispers that Zuko will never be allowed to choose who he marries, even if someday he does find someone he loves. 

Then his grandfather dies, and his mother is gone, and Uncle Iroh is not the Fire Lord, and Zuko does not have time to think about such fairytales. He does not speak or think of soulmates for a long time. 

Not long after a thirteen-year-old Zuko is banished from the Fire Nation, he and Uncle Iroh are meditating over candles when it strikes Zuko that he doesn’t know if his uncle has a soulmark. 

His uncle. The _Dragon_ of the West. 

It would be impolite to ask out of the blue, so Zuko shifts out of his meditating position. Uncle peaks at him out of one eye, then opens both and watches Zuko pull the boot off of his left foot. Zuko carefully rolls up the end of his pants so Uncle can see his ankle. 

“A dragon,” Uncle says cautiously, like he isn’t sure what Zuko wants him to say. 

“Yes. I thought you might….” Zuko’s throat closes up.

“I don’t have a mark, nephew,” Uncle says, sounding sad. 

Zuko puts his shoe back on and tells Uncle that he’s going to bed. He’s too angry to keep a flame steady right now. 

His soulmate has never been a priority to him, but it becomes the last thing on his mind once he is banished. 

He chases the nonexistent Avatar for two years, and then he chases the existent Avatar. And then he lets the Avatar’s bison go, and he’s not even sure why, but Uncle says it’s because he’s undergoing a change of heart or whatever. Zuko doesn’t know about that. All he knows is that he’s so, so confused. 

He turns his back on Uncle and on Katara in the Crystal Catacombs. He gets back all he’s ever wanted and he’s still not satisfied. He’s still impossibly confused. 

Even though he’s betrayed Uncle, he doesn’t know how not to rely on him after the last three years. So when Uncle says he must find out what happened to his great-grandfather, he does. 

He reads Fire Lord Sozin’s writings, and for the most part, everything is exactly as he learned in his history lessons, except Sozin reveals that he and Avatar Roku were soulmates. 

They both had orange waves inscribed on their right hips, Sozin writes. When they found out as teenagers, they were both thrilled. When they were separated after Sozin’s wedding, they were both devastated. 

Fire Lord Sozin and Avatar Roku were best friends and soulmates, and Sozin left Roku to die. 

A voice in Zuko’s head whispers that maybe Lu Ten’s soulmate was the person who killed him in the siege of Ba Sing Se. 

By the day of the Black Sun, Zuko has already seen plenty of times that there’s no mark on Uncle’s ankle, but it’s only when he sees the empty prison cell that he really understands it. 

He betrayed Uncle Iroh, and now he has left, and he will never forgive Zuko for what he did. Of course he could not be Zuko’s soulmate. 

But Zuko doesn’t care who his soulmate is now. He knows his destiny: to teach the Avatar to bend fire. 

Then, he’s tracking down the Avatar’s group, attempting to apologize to them, accidentally burning Toph, and meeting the Sun Warriors. He doesn’t have time or energy to even think of soulmates until he and Sokka are dressed as prison guards, standing on a terrace and looking out over the courtyard of Boiling Rock. 

Zuko is rambling in a poor imitation of Uncle Iroh giving advice when Sokka interrupts him to excitedly point out Suki. 

“Wait,” Sokka says, shocked. “Look at her arm!”

Zuko squints, and on Suki’s forearm is a bluish spot that he can’t quite make out from this distance. 

“Look,” Sokka repeats. This time, he tugs the sleeve off his own arm, revealing a blue snake on the same spot on his arm. “I didn’t know she was my soulmate!”

Sokka’s eyes are so bright with excitement that Zuko doesn’t even feel embarrassed that Sokka showed him his mark so suddenly. He only feels happy for him. 

Zuko stands guard at the door as Sokka tells Suki that he’s sorry they had to find out this way, instead of in their own time, but that he’s so happy to be her soulmate, and he hopes he’ll make her happy too. 

Zuko blows his cover trying to keep the other guards away from Suki and Sokka, but it’s worth it. And they all make it out, anyway.

Once they’ve escaped and returned to the campsite, Zuko expects Sokka and Suki to take the opportunity to cover their soulmarks. However, they don’t seem at all bothered by the lack of privacy. Even Sokka, who usually wears wrappings around his forearms, leaves his mark out in the open.

That night, as Zuko is serving tea to the others around the campfire, he asks Sokka about it. Apparently it’s a “water tribe thing.”

Toph seems intrigued. “In the Earth Kingdom, everyone was always secretive about soulmarks, even after you’ve found your soulmate,” she says, taking a sip of her tea.

“Really?” Suki asks. “I didn’t show strangers, of course, but there’s really no such thing as privacy around the Kyoshi warriors.”

Toph hums. “I guess it depends on where you are in the Earth Kingdom. But, to be fair, it’s not like I ever had any close friends to talk about soulmates with.”

Zuko pours one last cup and hands it to Aang, then sits cross-legged next to Sokka.

Sokka trails a finger along the winding blue snake on his arm. “That’s wild to me. I mean, I knew that in most places you aren’t supposed to walk around with your mark showing, but everyone knows everyone’s business in my and Katara’s village, so we didn’t bother to hide them there. I guess it would be different in the north, though.”

Katara shrugs. “I think no matter where you live it’s normal to know about your family’s soulmarks. And the village is basically like our family.”

Zuko wants to say that he doesn’t even know whether his father has a soulmark, let alone what it looks like or who his soulmate might be. He keeps his mouth shut and stares into the crackling fire.

“Well,” says Toph, “We know that Sokka and Suki have soulmarks, obviously. I don’t have one, unless my parents were lying to me. Not like I would know any better.”

Aang leans over toward Toph. “If you do, it’s not where we can see it,” he says.

“I figured. They wouldn’t have any reason to lie about something like that,” Toph replies with a shrug. “Anyway, now I’ve shared. Your turn.” She smacks Aang on the shoulder.

“Hey!” Aang exclaims. 

“Come on, just tell,” she says.

“Okay, okay, but you didn’t have to hit me!”

Toph grins. Sokka leans toward Zuko and quietly asks Zuko to heat his tea. Zuko rolls his eyes but takes the cup anyway.

Aang opens his mouth to speak again, then hesitates. He slants a look at Zuko, and the fire flickers, highlighting his conflicted expression. Feeling a little exposed and unsure why, Zuko looks away and stares into Sokka’s cup.

“Why are we even talking about something this personal when _he’s_ around?” she asks, motioning to Zuko. He tenses. “Besides, Aang doesn’t have to share if he’s not comfortable.”

Aang seemed plenty comfortable with it until he remembered Zuko was there, but Zuko isn’t keen to backtalk Katara right now.

“Zuko!” Sokka exclaims. “The tea!”

Sokka’s tea is boiling, Zuko realizes. He hurriedly sets the cup on the ground. “Ah, sorry, I didn’t realize it was—” Zuko clears his throat and stumbles to his feet. “I’ll go, so you can talk about whatever without having me around.”

Aang stands as well, and says, “Zuko, you don’t have to—”

“It’s fine. I wanted to go to sleep now anyway.”

“But—”

“I said, it’s _fine_ ,” Zuko snaps. The fire flares up briefly, and Aang shrinks away, looking briefly as terrified as Zuko imagines he used to look around Ozai. Zuko takes a deep breath, inwardly cursing his short temper, and turns to head toward his room. “Sorry for burning your tea,” he grumbles as he walks away.

He knew at this point to expect hostility from Katara, but knowing that Aang too was uncomfortable sharing something with Zuko made his heart twist painfully in his chest. He was hurt, and he felt guilty for being hurt, because what right did Zuko have to be upset with Aang? He’s the one who chased them for so long. He’s the one who just now snapped at Aang and frightened him. 

The next morning, however, Aang acts completely normal. At least, as normal as one can act when woken by an attack from Azula.

They go on the run again, and Zuko helps Katara find her mother’s killer. Katara spares the man, and Zuko wonders if he’d be as merciful.

On the way back from seeing the Ember Island Players perform, Zuko and Aang walk side-by-side, a sizable distance behind the others. Toph seemed entertained by the play, and Sokka clearly appreciates the special effects, but the way Aang dragged his feet suggested that he shared Zuko’s strong dislike for the show. 

“Are you… okay?” Zuko asks quietly.

“Yes,” Aang huffs unhappily. “It’s just… do you have a soulmate?”

“Um.” Zuko nearly trips over his feet. “Yes, but I’ve not met them yet.”

“I’m exactly the same!” Aang says, seemingly unaware of Zuko’s discomfort. “I had a suspicion of who mine might be, or at least I knew who I hoped it was, but now I’m worried I’ve messed it all up. Like, even if she—they somehow are my soulmate, they probably won’t ever like me back now.”

Zuko’s gaze flickers to Katara, who is far enough ahead of them that she certainly can’t hear them. “Um… I mean, I don’t know if this helps at all, but I don’t think who you date has anything to do with your soulmate.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well….” Zuko feels suddenly and uncomfortably more like an older brother than he ever felt around Azula. “Your soulmate is someone extremely important in your life. That could be your partner or your best friend or… anyone else. If she is your soulmate, you may not date her. Or, if she’s not your soulmate, you still could date her. Either way, I’m sure she… that is, I’m sure whoever you’re worried about will still be a good and important friend to you.”

Aang blinks. “I’ve never heard about it like that,” he says. “Thank you!”

And then Aang squeezes Zuko into a hug and continues walking before Zuko can even process what’s happening.

That is, of course, the calm before the storm that is Sozin’s Comet. Zuko defeats Azula, Aang defeats Ozai, and Zuko is going to be the new Fire Lord.

On the day of his coronation, Zuko pulls his hair into a top knot and bares his scar to the world. Manservants dress him in formal robes and place the Fire Lord’s distinguished pauldrons on his shoulders. Now all that is missing is the crown.

When Zuko approaches the curtains that separate him from the crowd, Aang is sitting with his back against the wall, waiting. 

They greet each other, and Aang hugs him, and Zuko is about to cross through the curtains when Aang stops him with a hand on his shoulder.

“Wait,” Aang says. He keeps his hand on Zuko’s shoulder to stay balanced and tugs at his pant leg up with his other hand. Circling Aang’s ankle is a red dragon that Zuko knows like the back of his hand. 

Aang looks at Zuko expectantly, and Zuko quickly pulls up the edge of his robe. “Ah, you can’t see it with these shoes, but I—that’s—I have that one too. We’re—”

“Soulmates,” Aang finishes. “Yeah.”

“I didn’t suspect at all.” Even as he says it, Zuko realizes that he surely should have expected it. Everything he’s done for years has centered around the Avatar, whether chasing him in a futile hope to earn his father’s love, or training him in firebending to defeat his father.

“I knew it wasn’t someone from 100 years ago, at least, because I went into the iceberg without a mark and came out with one. I guess I should’ve figured it out after we learned the Dancing Dragon and met Ran and Shaw, but I was kind of stuck on the idea of someone else. But you told me that you also had a soulmark, and then you explained that soulmates don’t have to be romantic. Then I noticed that you bandaged your ankles when we trained barefoot on Ember Island, so….” 

“I don’t think this is common knowledge,” says Zuko, “But Avatar Roku and Fire Lord Sozin were soulmates too.”

Aang smiles fondly, and there’s that odd distant look in his eyes that he gets sometimes. “I’m glad things worked out better for us.”

“Me too,” says Zuko.


End file.
